The Return Of The Chart Chumps

Now, if we are all being honest with each other the build up to the Christmas chart was more than a little disappointing, at least for those of us looking for a chance to gently mock those attempting to propel random track X to the top of the charts. Yes, the whole party was gatecrashed by that rather weird NHS Choir single, but this was in the end more as a result of some clever PR work rather than crowdsourced surge purchasing. They had a Facebook group but it was largely a placeholder – a dedicated website instead the hub of much of the public push. Even those hoping to see the Star Wars theme head chartwards were to be disappointed, the whole event going off rather half cocked and the track itself landing nowhere near the Top 100. An abundance of chart chumps (as documented in the last post on this site) there were not

Part of the problem was actually the absence of a suitable bogeyman to focus on. Cries of “we must stop X Factor topping the charts this Christmas” rang slightly hollow given that the X Factor winner’s single by Louisa Johnson was spending the holiday selling the sum total of knack all and indeed dropped out of the Top 10 completely in Christmas week itself. Instead the focus had to switch to a need to “stop Justin Bieber from being Number One at all costs”, a rather odd aim given that he was already Number One anyway, would continue to be so after Christmas and indeed it was never quite clear why it was so important that he should not be again. Like in all the best heroic romances, you need a proper dragon to slay. Without one you just don’t have a story.

But then salvation arrived, in the shape of what is in truth rather a sad story. On the morning of December 28th the world woke up to the news that Ian “Lemmy” Kilminster, one of the most notorious, celebrated, admired, scary and yet at the same time funniest and most affable heavy metal stars of his era had passed away suddenly at the age of 70. The tributes to him were fulsome, genuine and rightly drenched with hero worship. Inevitably the call went out: wouldn’t it be grand to see his masterpiece, his most famous composition and the piece of music with which he will forever be associated back in the charts. Can we see Ace Of Spades by Motorhead at Number One?

Over the years it has been so inevitable that the death, premature or otherwise, of a famous musician will see them return to the singles or albums chart in some form. So much so that it has almost become a cliche. When My Sweet Lord was re-released in January 2002 following the death of George Harrison it was almost a matter of routine that it shot to the top of the charts for a second time. Nobody paid it that much attention, it was just something that was pre-destined to happen, so it did. With the advent of the download era these chart returns tend to happen rather more organically, as evidenced by the flood of Michael Jackson singles that reached the sales charts in the aftermath of his 2009 demise, and to a lesser extent those of Amy Winehouse and Whitney Houston in the years that followed. It would indeed be no bad thing to see Ace Of Spades back for one last chart run – particularly given that its last journey into the mainstream was thanks to a famously hated (at least by metal die-hards) club remix which hit the charts in the summer of 1993. I bought the 12-inch of that just so I could own the copy of the original version which was on the b-side.

But no, these are the 2010s and we have to have a Facebook group to push for the great man’s inclusion in next week’s singles chart. And I’m pleased to say that it and indeed its followers are falling into every single one of the traps I warned of before Christmas. Quite entertainingly so as it happens.

First there are the mixed motives:

It is not just about Lemmy it seems. It is for some reason really, really important that Justin Bieber should be knocked of the top of the charts. No matter that with a variety of singles he’s been Number One for 11 of the past 18 weeks. He must not be there this week and Lemmy is the man to make this happen. Because he’s dead.

You will notice the unwavering belief in the cause too. This CAN be done we’re told. Repeatedly. The followers and supporters of the group only become more enthused when they check the status of the single on the live charts across the various retailers:

Yes Andy indeed it is. But the problem is Google Play is first and foremost a streaming service. They do have a click to buy store and those sales do indeed contribute to the charts, but their volumes in comparison to other services are to say the least minimal. You could record five minutes of sneezing, get your entire office to buy it, and make the Google Play live charts. The only live tables that truly reflect what is probably the current state of the market overall are the iTunes ones. Although dying a slow death, this remains the pre-eminent download store. So let’s look at where Ace Of Spades is on there shall we:

Oh.

Now, to be fair this was late on Monday evening and the main version of the track available has rallied a little during the course of today (Tuesday) to be just inside the Top 20 of the live tables. But it is still selling a little under 18% of the copies of the market leader – one Justin Bieber – and isn’t making further progress. People are being encouraged to buy multiple copies of the various different versions of the track available, but none are selling enough to register on the Top 100. Combined at the end they may be, but with just over two days to go to the end of the chart week this record is nowhere near in contention.

Still, the news of the midweek chart position only served to reinforce the hope that this all hasn’t been in vain:

Bieber is WITHIN SIGHT it seems. Well yes, yes he is in the sense that he’s at the end of the pit straight and you’ve just turned onto it. But as I noted before Christmas, in order to actually overtake him you’ve got to sell harder and faster than he is. For several days. And there’s absolutely no indication that you are going to come close to doing so.

But still, there’s always streams isn’t there? And despite the administrators of the Facebook page having muttered a few times about how “only the first 100 (70 actually) count”, there are still those determined to use up their spare processor cycles to attempt to game the system.

Of all the dedicated souls however, this one has to be my favourite:

Yes, that’s this chap’s very own streaming farm. Resurrecting old telephone handsets to run side by side and stream the track into oblivion 24 hours a day. Or if you like, the exact same thing people assumed that the record labels themselves would try to do and for which there were rules put in place to stop this happening. Quite why you’d imagine this would be regarded as a legitimate streaming ‘sale’ to qualify for the charts is a tiny bit of a mystery. Full marks for effort though, even if it will do nothing more than add a few pence to his next electricity bill.

What is funny about metal fans is that they often have some deeply-held principles which even the carrot of a chart return for their favourite veterans is unable to shift. Back in 2013 when the aim was to propel AC/DC to the business end of the singles chart there were any number of people on the relevant Facebook group rather grumpy about the fact that the only way to download the single was to sign up to iTunes, a piece of corporate teat-sucking that they just could not bring themselves to perform. No such problems here of course with Motorhead available for purchase on just about every platform you could name, but that didn’t stop one man throwing up his own obstacles:

That’s Barry there, not prepared to register his personal details and hand them over to someone who might do nefarious things with the information. And who is choosing to use his Facebook account to tell us this.

I mock with the best of intentions. As I stated at the top, to see Lemmy’s musical masterpiece enter the singles chart even for a brief moment to commemorate his passing is nothing less than his memory and legacy deserves. If it is good enough for Cilla then it is good enough for him. But you do have to remember the first and most important rule of chart chumpery – be realistic. The record won’t be Number One in his or indeed our lifetimes. Top 30 come Friday is a reasonable aim. Top 20 will be a job well done. The owners of the page will be magnanimous enough to hail that at least as an achievement, even if many of the followers and commenters will of course be convinced that a fix was in. Watch this space.

UPDATE: as of close of play Tuesday, Ace Of Spades has slipped to 12 on the latest unofficial set of midweek figures I’ve seen. Meanwhile Justin Bieber appears set for a unique singles chart first, commanding the entire Top 3 of the singles chart for himself. There’s going to be carnage on Facebook.